The trouble with Kids Company
It’s a favourite charity of David Cameron and many celebrities. But does it do what it claims to do?
Investment: Build your own pension
More freedom means more chance to make mistakes. Here’s how to use the Osborne reforms responsibly
Investment: Euro stars
How much the economy does or doesn’t grow from here is neither here nor there for the stock market
Fez
For the visitor, Fez offers up extremes by the hour, be it the beggar a palatial riad hotel or hammer blows from the metalworkers market set against the calm of the mosque
Beautiful losers
The last ruler of the Persian empire will always be eclipsed by his famous adversary Alexander the Great, according to a review of Darius by Pierre Briant
A perfect nightmare
A review of The Utopia Experiment by Dylan Evans reminds us that designs for living always end in tears, or worse
Addicted to trouble
Following S.J. Watson’s bestselling Before I Go to Sleep, Second Life provides a similarly compelling, claustrophobic slice of domestic noir
The writing on the wall
A review of Mad Men and Bad Men by Sam Delaney suggests that the admen in charge of political campaigns are the first to doubt their effectiveness
The very stuff of life
In a review of A Spool of Blue Thread, Anne Tyler’s latest and possibly last novel, Susan Hill is captivated by the everyday lives of an unremarkable Baltimore family
Ten days in May
A review of After Hitler by Michael Jones describes the last defiant days of the German Reich and how the SS continued to massacre women and children to the bitter end
Soviet smoke and mirrors
A review of Nothing is True and Everything is Possible by Peter Pomerantsev describes the chilling world of modern Russia where the aim is to fool all the people all of the time
Results
The school holidays in the final furlong and the next new phase and term in clear sight. This is when…
Christ of the coal mines
William Cook reports from the sooty Belgian netherworld near Mons that made an artist of Van Gogh
Art of noise
Paul Morley reports from two experimental new exhibitions: PJ Harvey at Somerset House and Christian Marclay at the White Cube
Dudamel’s dilemma
Damian Thompson explores the politics of classical music from the butt-kissing of Dudamel and Gergiev to the German nationalism of Christian Thielemann
Master class
Edward Gardner’s conducting was so good he should be knighted forthwith, insists Michael Tanner
High life
But last week in Gstaad was as good as it gets: the slopes were empty, the sun shining and the snow perfect
